Gloves are commercially molded on hand-shaped glove forms by dipping the forms into a liquid rubber formulation such as a latex, a vinyl plastisol, or the like. The dip mold is then withdrawn, generally with the finger portions of the glove and mold facing downwardly, and the film of rubber formulation is allowed to cure, usually assisted by a heating step. Thereafter, the rubber gloves are stripped off of the molds for packaging and distribution.
Rubber gloves have a tendency for their cuffs to roll down along the wrist portion during use. For this reason, some commercially available gloves are provided with relatively thick, circumferential bands or beaded cuffs, in an attempt to minimize the cuff roll-down problem.
Another company sells a glove which defines longitudinal fluting or channels positioned about the circumference of the wrist portion, with a similar end in mind.
The problem is particularly burdensome in the area of surgeon's gloves, in view of the critical nature of the surgeon's activity, and also in view of the danger that the sterile field on the gloves may be compromised by attempts to reroll the glove back upwardly along the surgeon's arm.
The invention of this application provides a glove, and a dipping mold for manufacturing such gloves, in which the molded pattern impressed on the wrist portion of the glove provides a significant improvement in the capability of the gloves to avoid the cuff roll-down problem, without the need of resorting to bands or beads about the cuffs, which are difficult to mold or attach to the gloves. This invention can provide significantly improved results over corresponding gloves exhibiting only longitudinal flutes or channels, as well as many banded or beaded-cuff gloves. The glove of this invention is easily manufactured by conventional dipping processes, and thus provides improved performance without any significant addition in manufacturing costs.